Contemporary Literature in French (Level 5)

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 5
• Convenor: Professor Akane Kawakami
• Assessment: two 2500-word essays (50% each)

This module seeks to give you a taste of contemporary works of French prose and poetry, encouraging you to read more widely and make comparisons with contemporary developments in other languages. You will also gain an insight into what is happening today in literary culture in France.

Indicative module syllabus

• Fatou Diome, Le ventre de l'Atlantique (2003)
• Nina Bouraoui, Tous les hommes désirent naturellement savoir (2018)
• Michel Houellebecq, Soumission (2015)
• Sorj Chalandon, Retour à Killybegs (2011)
• Annie Ernaux, Mémoire de fille (2016)
• Michaël Ferrier, Scrabble: une enfance tchadienne (2019)

By the end of this module, you will have:

• demonstrated relevant, factual knowledge about the French and Francophone texts, contexts and issues under discussion
• evaluated the prescribed texts at a thematic as well as linguistic and stylistic level
• worked within historical and theoretical frameworks in the interpretation of the prescribed texts.